Framingham: Class of 1947 reunites 70 years later

NATICK – When Jo Contigiani was in high school, she knew how to catch a free movie.

With World War II raging, the Hollis Theater in downtown Framingham collected scrap metal for the war effort.

“So if you wanted to get in free, you would bring in a piece of aluminum, like a coffee pot or a bowl or something,” Contigiani recalled.

Around 20 members of the Framingham High School Class of 1947 – which started with 247 graduates – dined at Morse Tavern in Natick Saturday for a class reunion.

Rosanne Bertolino Thomas and some fellow members of the Class of 1947 attended elementary school together. They lived in the Tripoli section of Framingham, a historically Italian neighborhood on the south side of town.

“The Roosevelt School was at the top of the hill from our neighborhood, we all walked there,” she said. “Then we went to Memorial (School), which was almost a mile but we still had to walk, and walked home for lunch.”

There were no school buses when they were in high school, said Thomas, whose family has run the Framingham Baking Co. on Waverly Street for 100 years.

“If we didn’t walk … one mile from downtown and another half a mile to the school, we took a bus for 10 cents,” she said. “And if we were lucky we had 15 cents to buy an ice cream Sunday at the Waverly Drug Store.”

“Those are the things I remember. A lot of happy times, a lot of nice kids in the neighborhood.”

Contigiani has stayed friends with fellow reunion organizers Millie Dooley Bedard and Betty Frazer Benefito since they met in high school. After skipping school together one time senior year, they had to clean the ovens as punishment.

The group recalled the three movie theaters that used to enliven downtown Framingham: Hollis, St. George and Gorman.

For Dooley and Benefito, the Hollis Theater provided the backdrop for romance one day, when at age 17 they met a pair of handsome boys at the back of the theater.

“And we went over my house and then we’re thinking, OK, now which one do you want? Do you want Norm or do you want Ken?” Dooley said.

They sorted it out eventually: “We married them.”

At 89, Dooley’s brother, Normand Dooley, is two years older than the rest of the Class of 1947. In 1944, at age 17, he enlisted in the U.S. Navy and was deployed to the Pacific.

“I went to join the Marines. My brother was a Marine, he was in Guadalcanal, and he said you have to be 17 and a half,” he said. “Of course so I joined the Navy. I was going to get in.”

Anna Pellegri, another reunion organizer, played the lead role in the school play her senior year, “Dulcy.”

Natick’s Morse Tavern, where the reunion was held, is a former ice cream shop that used to host car shows in the parking lot, she said.

In the 1940s, under the leadership of Mr. Magoon, the principal, students could choose to go to college, work in an office or work at home.

At that time, there were only three years of high school, with ninth grade considered part of middle school.

After 70 years, the Class of 1947’s reunion Saturday was likely its last, the longtime organizers said.

“I haven’t missed any,” Thomas said.

Jonathan Dame can be reached at 508-626-3919 or jdame@wickedlocal.com. Follow him on Twitter @DameReports

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